Star Trek: Typhon Pact - 13 - The Fall: Peaceable Kingdoms

by Dayton Ward

  “Look out!” Crusher cried, grabbing onto his arm and pulling him back into the airlock. She ducked as another phaser beam flashed past her head, chewing into the bulkhead behind her and inside the outer hatch. By now Tom was reacting, bringing up his own weapon and snapping off a single shot in the direction from where the attack had come. Without looking, he reached behind him and gripped Crusher’s jacket.

  “We need to get out of here,” he said. “Even if there’s only one shooter out there, he’s probably already called his friends for help.”

  “What do you want to do?”

  “Make a lot of noise,” Tom replied, leaning around the edge of the airlock’s outer hatch and firing once more into the darkness. This time, he did not stop after a single shot but instead continued firing, altering his aim with the weapon’s every discharge. “Come on!” Grabbing her wrist, he pulled her behind him and they both dropped to the ground. He maintained his covering fire as they dashed away from the transport, heading for the meager cover afforded by a collection of massive cargo pods arrayed in haphazard fashion upon a large gravel field. Pausing at the corner of the closest container, Tom guided her to relative safety before turning and releasing another string of fire.

  “I don’t know if I hit anything,” he said, reaching inside his jacket, “but I guess it won’t matter in a minute.” He extracted a small, palm-sized device with a black finish and a burnished gold cover, and Crusher recognized it as an obsolete style of Starfleet communicator. Flipping it open, he pressed one of the unit’s control buttons, and a moment later Crusher heard the first muffled explosion from inside the transport. It was followed in rapid succession by the additional charges detonating, and she saw several of the craft’s external running lights flicker before going dark. Elsewhere in the depot, alarms began to sound, and at least one person shouted in the distance.

  “That should do it,” Tom said, moving past her on his way deeper into the collection of cargo pods. “We should keep moving. The others are waiting at the rally point, and I want to get a jump on heading for the Olanda camp before these guys figure out what we’re up to.”

  “No argument here.” Getting to the labor camp would not be a simple task, now that they had been denied the assistance of the Dordogne’s transporter. Other transporters were available, of course, but using them meant leaving behind a possible record of their transit and their destination, information that could be found and exploited by their still-unidentified adversaries. Konya and Cruzen, in addition to safeguarding Ilona Daret, also were exploring alternative modes of transportation.

  With Crusher following Tom, they worked their way to the cargo pod’s far end while trying not to make too much noise as they traversed the gravel beneath their feet. Slowing at the container’s corner, Tom peered around its edge. Angled as he was and trying to look to his left, he did not see the shadow cast on the wall of the adjacent container. Crusher did.

  “Tom!”

  A dark figure dressed all in black emerged from hiding and slammed into Tom, sending them both into the pod’s metal bulkhead. Tom grunted in surprise and momentary pain, and Crusher heard something metallic dropping to the gravel. She saw his phaser lying at their feet, but Tom’s assailant was fast, kicking away the weapon before Tom could retrieve it. Crusher raised her own phaser, looking for a clear shot, but the men were too close to each other.

  When the attacker raised an arm and advanced, Tom stepped into the attack, throwing up his left arm and blocking the other man’s downward swing. His opponent moved with practiced ease, pivoting and ducking beneath Tom’s arm and lashing out with his other fist. The punch sank into Tom’s side and he growled, but Crusher realized it was more in anger than pain.

  What followed was a series of rapid strikes, each aimed at a vulnerable spot on the other man’s body. The attacker was able to block some of them, but Tom’s hands were almost a blur, lashing out and catching the other man in the throat, the groin, and even one solid punch to the face. Staggering backward, the assailant tried to reset himself and prepare for a new attack, but by then Crusher had leveled her phaser and pressed its firing stud. The bright orange beam hit the man, and he sagged against the wall of the cargo pod before slumping to the ground, unconscious.

  “Are you all right?” she asked, stepping closer and verifying that the other man was stunned.

  Leaning against the neighboring container as he tried to catch his breath, Tom nodded. “Yeah, I think so. Thanks for that.” He grimaced as he rubbed his right side. “I thought he might have had me for a minute there.”

  Crusher knelt next to the fallen attacker, whose face was covered by a black balaclava. She pulled away the mask, revealing what at first appeared to be a Bajoran male. “Recognize him?”

  “No,” Tom said, moving closer, “but that doesn’t mean anything. If this guy’s some kind of mercenary or special-operations agent, his identity’s likely classified.”

  “You’re probably right,” Crusher replied, “but I’m taking a DNA sample and a retinal scan, anyway. We might get lucky.” Using her medical tricorder, she quickly gathered a blood specimen and recorded a scan of the unconscious Bajoran’s eyes. “Putting a name to him would definitely help shed some light on whoever had sent him here, along with how much danger Ilona and the rest of us are facing.” She hoped that she might have an opportunity to transmit this information to the Enterprise, along with the data regarding Ishan Anjar. It had been decided not to attempt contacting the starship from Jevalan for fear of their communications—no matter how encrypted—being intercepted by unwanted eavesdroppers.

  Keeping his attention divided between her and the different avenues of approach to them from between the cargo containers, Tom asked, “Are you sure you want the answers to those questions?”

  Crusher sighed.

  Not really.

  Twenty-four

  It required physical effort for Jacob Barrows not to kill the security officer where he stood. With every passing moment, he considered and discarded another in a series of effective ways to dispatch the interloper and dispose of his body. Of course, that now would be problematic in broad daylight, the sun having risen less than an hour earlier.

  Maybe next time.

  “A disturbance such as this is most unusual,” said the officer, a Bajoran who had identified himself as Sikra Lyros. “We received reports of weapons fire at undetermined locations in this vicinity just prior to the incident aboard your ship. Do you know anything about that?”

  With practiced ease, Barrows affected an expression of surprise as he stood on the tarmac before the transport’s open hatch, and with no effort whatsoever crafted a simple lie. “No, sir. None of my people reported hearing anything like that. Most of us were sacked out in our bunks just before the explosions, and then things got pretty hectic. It was all we could do just to contain the fire and make sure nobody was hurt.” Frowning, he added, “Are you saying someone was fighting out here?”

  Even as he spoke, he ignored the onlookers watching the exchange from what they probably thought was a discreet distance near the far end of the tarmac or near the main thoroughfare cutting through the center of the landing facility and flanked by ship berths. Morning had brought out all manner of maintenance personnel as well as the crews from other docked vessels, but Barrows did not recognize Crusher or her Starfleet team among the various faces gathered around the facility at this early hour.

  Seemingly oblivious to his audience, Sikra shrugged. “We have had disagreements between the crews of different vessels in the past, but it is a fairly uncommon occurrence.” He paused, examining a data padd he held in his left hand. “As for your own difficulties, those do not sound ordinary, either. Have you experienced anything like them before?”

  “No, sir,” Barrows replied, “I mean, we’ve had systems malfunctions, of course, but nothing like this. We’re overdue for drydock and some major refitting, but I was hoping I could stretch it until the end of the month. I’ve got a c
ouple of time-sensitive charters I can’t afford to miss, that sort of thing.” He shook his head, reminding himself not to overplay his dejected air. “So much for that idea. It’s going to take me months to recover from this.”

  There was no hiding the explosions that had been unleashed aboard the transport. Barrows’s only recourse had been to describe the incident as some kind of internal accident, which of course would invite an inspection by the dock quartermaster to determine the transport’s priority with respect to receiving support services and personnel to aid with repairs. That did not bother Barrows; he and his team would be able to employ whatever deception was required to appease the quartermaster as well as Sikra. It was the time they were wasting with these activities that bothered him.

  The Starfleet team—possessing far greater covert action skills and assertiveness than Barrows had credited them—had successfully rendered the ship all but useless. Hardest hit had been the cockpit, in particular the helm console. While flight control could be rerouted to another station elsewhere on the ship, it would make navigating and overseeing the transport’s key systems problematic. Of more immediate concern was the loss of the vessel’s sensor array as well as its arsenal and supply caches. The saboteurs had been quite thorough on that front, depriving Barrows and his team of most of their weapons and other field equipment save for those few items carried on their persons or stored elsewhere on the ship. Obtaining replacements for all but the most illicit components of their gear would be addressed through simple scrounging if not outright theft around the landing area and the neighboring settlement, though a reconnoiter of the outpost and its accompanying cadre of scientists and support personnel had revealed little in the way of weapons.

  One thing at a time, Barrows reminded himself. Deal with the immediate problem first. Get rid of this idiot.

  “I have already spoken to the dock quartermaster,” Sikra said. “She is working to free up personnel, but she anticipates not being be able to supply you with a repair team until the day after tomorrow, and she apologizes for the delay and resulting inconvenience.”

  In truth, there was no point spending time or resources trying to effect repairs to the damaged systems. For the moment, locating and securing Ilona Daret was the priority, after which Barrows could concern himself with finding alternative transportation from Jevalan.

  These thoughts flashed through Barrows’s mind as he regarded Sikra with a look of restrained irritation. “I guess if that’s the best she can do, there’s no sense complaining about it. We can get by with our own repairs for some of the damage while we wait.”

  This seemed to satisfy the officer. “Very well, then. If you will excuse me, I have to look into the other incident. Contact my office or the quartermaster if we can be of further assistance.” Despite the words, Barrows sensed the Bajoran still harbored skepticism regarding the predawn excitement that had been visited upon his normal, quiet makeshift community. If he had any instincts at all, the security officer would not be satisfied with the explanation he had been given, and he likely would continue his investigation. That might be hazardous, Barrows decided.

  There’s nothing you can do about it now without attracting attention. Deal with it if and when you have to.

  “Thank you for your time,” he said, offering a respectful nod before Sikra turned and made his way across the tarmac in the direction of the quartermaster’s office and the dock’s administration facility. Barrows waited until the Bajoran was out of sight before releasing a long, exasperated breath.

  “Damn, I already hate this place.”

  Hearing footsteps behind him, Barrows turned to see one of his team’s other human members, Tobias Paquette, exiting the transport and dropping to the ground. The man looked tired, with grime smeared across his forehead and left cheek; his hands and clothing also were dirty. As the team’s designated mechanic, it fell to Paquette to affect any emergency repairs to the ship in the event better-equipped facilities were unavailable.

  “You want the good news or the bad news?” he asked, propping himself against the access hatch’s lower edge before reaching up to wipe his face. The action left a fresh streak of dirt along his nose.

  Barrows grunted. “There’s good news?”

  “Not really.” Retrieving a rag from the back pocket of his dark blue coveralls, Paquette began cleaning his hands. “The helm is shot to hell. No way I can fix it without a full repair crew. Same with the sensors, and the weapons and supply lockers are a total loss.” He sighed in apparent disgust. “According to my tricorder, whoever did this used a Klingon explosive compound called qo’legh. It’s created using three chemicals that are inert when separated. Covert agents like it because the individual components don’t show up on a lot of scans.”

  Frowning, Barrows said, “I’ve heard of it, but it’s not something you just have in some starship supply locker. I doubt a Starfleet security officer would even know about it, unless they were trained in a broad range of demolitions.”

  “Exactly. This doctor and her security detail are getting help from someone, and that someone is one sneaky bastard.”

  This was surprising news, but not particularly worrisome, Barrows decided. As a covert operative for Starfleet Intelligence, he had been trained to expect that missions always encountered setbacks, as well as to endure and adapt to all manner of eventualities. The years since that initial training and the experience he had gained both during and after his time in uniform—including the year he had spent as leader of the covert action team and its top-secret designation Active Six—only served to solidify what his instructors had sought to teach him: “Always expect the unexpected.”

  More concerning to Barrows was his poor assumption that he and his team had arrived at the planet well ahead of anyone sent to retrieve the Cardassian doctor and whatever information he had been given by his Bajoran friend Raal Mosara. This was not the case, and the situation had been complicated by the Starfleet contingent’s ability to evade several attempts at surveillance and pursuit by the Active Six’s nine-member team. Much of their rivals’ success seemed to stem from the assistance they were receiving from a fourth member of their group, who remained unidentified and whose background information was not included in the dossiers provided to Barrows and his companions. So far as the team had been able to determine, this mysterious fourth individual was not a member of the Enterprise crew and had not accompanied Crusher and her people to Jevalan.

  Whoever he is, he had good teachers, too.

  Both men grew quiet as Barrows heard the sound of footsteps approaching from the tarmac. He turned to see two of his team’s Bajoran members, Fredil Pars and Contera Hilbis, walking toward them. Barrows noted that Contera still walked with a slight limp, perhaps owing to the injuries he had sustained in his earlier fight with the unidentified human accompanying Crusher. As for Fredil, she looked as she always did: angry, and wanting to hurt someone.

  “What’s the story?” Barrows asked in a low voice as his companions moved closer. Fredil’s initial response was to offer a derisive snort while rolling her eyes.

  “They’re gone,” she said, reaching up to rub her right earlobe, something she did out of habit whenever she refrained from wearing her traditional Bajoran earring, a symbol of her faith. “We checked the Cardassian’s home and lab, but they’d already left. From the looks of things, he packed light.”

  Barrows already expected that development. “What about Raal’s house?”

  “Nothing there, either,” replied Contera, “though we got the sense that they may have been there before taking off, too.”

  Paquette said, “Probably looking for the same thing we are, whatever the hell that is. I knew we should’ve stuck closer to Crusher.”

  “We couldn’t do that without attracting their attention,” Barrows countered. “Or anyone else’s, for that matter.”

  “I think that plan’s pretty much run its course,” Paquette said, continuing to wipe his hands with the dirty rag.
“These people aren’t stupid. If they’re not here, then they may already have found another way off planet, and if that’s the case? We have no way in hell of knowing where they might end up—at least, not until they pop up on the Federation News Service.”

  “There’s no way they could’ve found whatever it is Raal hid for Daret and be out of here already. Crusher and her people haven’t been here long enough, and though they’ve managed to sneak around here and there, they haven’t been out of our sight long enough to have made any major discovery. If they’d found something in the last day or so, they’d have left, but even that would’ve been difficult without their runabout, and we’ve been monitoring all the ship traffic from here, anyway.” Barrows gestured to Contera. “Instead, they hung around long enough to trash our ship and knock you around.” Pausing, he regarded the Bajoran, who bore fresh bruises on his face and neck from his skirmish with the unidentified human. “Speaking of which, are you okay?”

  Contera scowled, reaching up to gingerly touch where his wrinkled nose sported bruises and gave him the appearance of having two black eyes. “I’ll recover.”

  “Did you get a look at him?” Paquette asked.

  “He was a human, with a beard, but it was dark, so I didn’t see much more than that. He had some Starfleet unarmed combat training, but his fighting style was a mixture of different techniques.” Contera touched the swollen area beneath his left eye and winced. “I’ll be wanting a rematch.”

  “We’ll see what we can do,” Barrows replied.

  Fredil said, “So they’re still here, and they’re still looking for whatever Raal left for Daret. We don’t know what that is, which means they’re still at least one step ahead of us.”

  “That won’t last,” Barrows countered, “not if they don’t have a ship.” The Starfleet team’s runabout had been dispatched thanks to Fredil’s tireless efforts to access the ship’s onboard computer. Its pilots had done an exceptional job establishing an encrypted lockout algorithm, but their skills were no match for the Bajoran’s technical prowess. Though it had taken her several hours to defeat the protection scheme without triggering any alerts or other notifications to Crusher or her companions, Fredil ultimately had succeeded in penetrating the security protocols, providing her with access to the runabout’s helm and navigational systems. This had allowed her to set the ship on a course that would remove it from use by the Starfleet officers, sending it as she did into the Doltiri system’s sun. Without the ship and whatever supplies and other equipment it might have carried, Barrows hoped that its loss would hamper Crusher and her team. For the moment, at least, they seemed to be adapting to that turn of events.